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  • In 2013, Jeff Bezos introduced the world to a concept that promised to revolutionize delivery.

  • “[00:00:20] Charlie Rose: Bezos kept telling us that he had a big surprise, something he

  • wanted to unveil for the first time [...] Bezos: but there's no reason they can't be used

  • as delivery vehicles.”

  • Within a matter of years autonomous drones would engulf cities, sweeping across skies,

  • delivering packages to front yards just thirty minutes after their order.

  • The announcement floored Charlie Rose and America alikegrabbing headlines for weeks

  • and setting off fiery debates over just how disruptive the disruptive technology would

  • be.

  • Drones would offer urban and suburban consumers a clean, quick, convenient delivery option

  • for food, medicine, or whatever else five-pounds-or-less without burning fossil fuels, without getting

  • stuck in traffic, without making them wait.

  • The idea felt far-fetched, it was exciting, it was the future arriving in front of our

  • very eyes, and it signaled that the race to take delivery drones to market was on

  • By the time Amazon landed its first package, Zipline was already delivering medical supplies

  • in Rwanda, SkyDrop had flown a 7-Eleven slurpee and a Dominos pizza straight to consumers,

  • and Google's Project Wing had air dropped burritos to hungry college kids.

  • A wave of startups sent their maiden drone deliveries skyward to much media fanfare while

  • major parcel couriersDHL, UPS, FedExsubstantiated the hype by partnering with the budding tech

  • companies set to help solve their last mile problems.

  • Inventors, investors, eccentric billionaires, and the world's biggest companies were all

  • pulling the same rope.

  • Anything, anywhere, anytime: the dark days of Doordash and two-day delivery were over;

  • the drone delivery era was comingor so it seemed

  • It's now 2022 and save for the smallest fraction of a percent of people, it's not

  • automated drones dropping off your small packages and food orders.

  • Pizzas aren't falling from the sky, they're showing up in the hands of a highschooler.

  • Burritos aren't delicately dropped on your lawn from above, they're left on your doorstep

  • by a hustling gig worker.

  • Your Amazon order won't show up in thirty minutes, it probably won't even show up

  • same-day.

  • The world 60 Minutes introduced in 2013, the world that felt closer and closer to reality

  • with every inaugural delivery, just isn't here

  • Fundamentally, the fast delivery niche still exists.

  • The last mile still accounts for around 40% of parcel shipping costs, roads are still

  • increasingly clogged with traffic, green shipping alternatives are still desperately needed,

  • and consumers still want products as cheap and as fast as possible.

  • Outside of a few specific locations, drone delivery has yet to take offand in those

  • few specific locations, it's hardly more than a proof of concept.

  • Certainly, delays are understoodexpected evenwhen it comes to the acceptance of

  • a disruptive technology.

  • Delayed acceptance though, is at very most only part of the story

  • In 2021, Amazon fired staff and closed its Prime Air offices in the UK.

  • From the former center of Amazon's drone project emerged stories of mismanagement and

  • disarray: employees drank beers at their desks, managers were given no direction, executives

  • ignored the stalling division aside from the occasional pizza party.

  • While the company responded to these reports with a statement affirming its continued investment

  • in drone delivery, Amazon hasn't released any promotional material for the project since

  • 2016 and Prime Air's website doesn't seem to have been updated in years.

  • The most generous possible interpretation is that Amazon's project is definitively

  • on the backburner.

  • Others aren't even there.

  • While Amazon remains quiet on their future intentions, DHL announced in summer 2021 that

  • it was officially abandoning its parcelcopter project nearly eight years after it's maiden

  • flight

  • So, two of the most important drone delivery companies put their programs on ice, few companies

  • are getting the investment they used to, and no company has yet realized the imminent future

  • of widespread operations laid out a decade ago.

  • So, what went so wrong with drone delivery

  • Well, this is Phoenix—a sprawling desert metropolis home to 5 million people.

  • On first glance, Phoenix seems the perfect candidate for a drone delivery service: its

  • year-round sunny, dry, still climate would make for easy, reliable flight conditions;

  • its autonomous innovation friendly city and state governments would welcome them with

  • open arms; and its sprawling, low-density neighborhoods would make for countless hungry

  • and impatient residents lacking walkable dining and shopping options.

  • Surely, this is the low-hanging fruit.

  • Surely, a drone delivery company could come in, connect any house with any product within

  • minutes, and demand would immediately outstrip supply, right

  • Well, perhaps not.

  • Connecting any house with a drone delivery provider doesn't quite work because in the

  • center of the city, right here, is Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport.

  • In order to assure the safety of arriving and departing aircraft at the busy hub, the

  • FAA restricts the use of drones within this area.

  • So, a Phoenix drone delivery service probably just couldn't operate hereand here,

  • in the restricted airspace around Luke Air Force Baseand here, around Phoenix Goodyear

  • Airportand here, and here, and here, here, and here.

  • It's not entirely impossible to operate drones within restricted airspace, but, from

  • a legal perspective, it ranges from somewhat to extremely difficultenough that it probably

  • wouldn't be worth pursuing for a drone delivery company, at least at the start

  • The rest of Phoenix, though, is fair gameto an extent.

  • You see, drones need somewhere to deliver to, and it's got to be safe.

  • When the concept was first introduced, the vision typically presented was of a drone

  • flying down, landing on one's lawn, releasing its delivery, then taking off and flying away.

  • That didn't work

  • at least not in reality.

  • Drone delivery is a novel technology and, like any novel technology, the public views

  • it with an air of distrustthe worst thing the industry could do is prove that distrust

  • warranted with a series of high-profile accidents at launch.

  • The first instance of a delivery drone injuring a customer will inevitably ignite a media

  • firestorm, which could lead to a legislative clampdown, so manufacturers naturally must

  • strive for perfection.

  • Perfection is tough to scale, though.

  • Delivery drones must act autonomously to be cost competitive, and autonomous operations

  • require computer vision and artificial intelligence able to reliably identify a clear landing

  • zone.

  • Determining whether someone is behind or infront of a window, noticing when a dog is running

  • towards the drone, knowing what's a pool and what's dry groundthese are all challenging

  • for a computer to tackle on its own, and so attaining perfection proves rather difficult

  • Therefore, whereas the logistics field generally considers the last mile of delivery the most

  • difficultonce the economies of scale are gonedrone delivery is a last mile solution

  • with its own last foot problem.

  • It's fairly straightforward to get a drone to a couple dozen feet above the groundgetting

  • a package safely to the ground has proven more challenging

  • Some solutions have emerged: Zipline, focusing on longer-distance delivery to a set number

  • of facilities with dedicated delivery zones, drops its payload in a packaging with an attached

  • parachute that carries it to the ground.

  • Matternet also uses dedicated zones for delivering to commercial facilities, while they've

  • developed a system of delivery stations for use by urban consumers.

  • Uber Eats, meanwhile, implemented a scrappy yet inefficient system where delivery drones

  • would land on the top of delivery drivers' cars, then those delivery drivers would walk

  • the food to the customer's door.

  • Most solutions for the last foot problem, however, have gravitated towards one method.

  • Wing, Skydrop, Flytrex, Wingcopter, and others have developed systems where their drones

  • hover above the destination at a safe height and lower their payloads to the ground using

  • cordsfar less risky than landing a heavy drone propelled by fast-moving rotors.

  • What all these solutions have in common is that they require a roomy, controlled, obstruction-free

  • area to make their final deliveries.

  • However, in the places where people actually live, that's hardly a given.

  • Yards are the best delivery zones that are widespread, but not everyone has a yard.

  • While it's a safe bet for single-family homes in an area like Phoenix, it can be hit

  • or miss whether multi-family homes and apartment buildings have a big enough yard and, even

  • when they do, their communal nature means that the customer couldn't necessarily guarantee

  • that the landing area would be free from obstructions as would be the case with their own, private

  • yard.

  • So, at least for an early drone delivery service, it probably wouldn't work in restricted airspace

  • and probably not for anything beyond single-family homes either

  • These and other legal, technological, and practical constraints combined mean that the

  • scope of what works in terms of drone delivery is narrow.

  • It's pretty easy to start crossing off citiesBoston's winter is too harsh, New York's density

  • inhibits yards, DC's airspace is too restricted, Pittsburgh's landscape is too hilly, this

  • could go on and on.

  • Even within the cities that might work, there are only so many areas that might work.

  • While it varies by company, most delivery drones tend to be able to fly to deliveries

  • as far as about six miles away.

  • So, assuming early operations would base out of a single location to capture economies

  • of scale, meaning their drones would have to return to said location to charge after

  • each delivery, that means a viable first delivery zone in Phoenixoptimizing for a large area,

  • free of airspace restrictions, centered on wealthier neighborhoodswould be this.

  • 310,987 people live in this zone—a small chunk of the metro area's 5 million.

  • However, in Phoenix, only 63.2% of housing units are single-family, which are likely

  • to have the private yard necessary for a delivery, and only 92% are occupied meaning, in this

  • prime zone, at least extrapolating using city-wide data, which is the most precise available,

  • there are only 180,820 possible users of a drone delivery service.

  • This is, clearly, an imprecise methodology, but it's indicative of how the prospect

  • of drone deliverythe prospect of anything, anywhere, anytimeis getting diminished,

  • and diminished, and diminished down into a niche service for a lucky few.

  • A small system linking a strip mall to the neighborhood behind it, a fixed route flying

  • COVID vaccines from a distribution center to vaccination sites, six shops delivering

  • to a small part of a small town in Virginiadrone delivery has hardly moved beyond proof of

  • concept, and it's not even clear that they've proved the concept

  •  In 2016, when asked about same-day delivery, 70% of respondents said they were content

  • with the cheapest option while just 23% of respondents said they'd pay more for same-day.

  • For drones to prove commercially viable they'd need to decisively corner that quarter of

  • more willing consumers, and to become ubiquitous, they'd likely need to operate at no extra

  • charge from ground delivery at all.

  • Most people, it turns out, are simply okay with waiting a day or two for their packages,

  • while all want them delivered as quickly and as cheaply as possible

  • When the drone delivery hype hit fever pitch, one bit of nuance went overlooked.

  • Consumers simply don't care about how a package gets from b to c, so long as it's

  • quick, cost-efficient, and reliablethey'd opt for a new technology once for the novelty,

  • but by the 100th time that wears off.

  • Eventually rationality will return.

  • In fact, when surveyed in 2020, consumers perceived drones to potentially threaten those

  • most important factors for deliverythey said they were uncertain about drones' reliability,

  • cost, and were worried about the job loss they could incite.

  • Meanwhile, competitors have figured out a number of low-tech solutions that fulfill

  • these consumer desires: look no further than food delivery apps

  • Since 2017, the very moment when drone delivery hype hit fever pitch, the food delivery industry

  • has tripled in size, ballooning into a $150 billion sector globally.

  • In this, speed matters and consumers expect to pay for the delivery costfacts that

  • seemingly pave a lane for drone delivery.

  • But between Uber Eats, Grubhub, and Doordash, the power players are already established

  • and the competition is already fierce.

  • These comparably low-tech companies don't even tell the consumer whether to expect their

  • burger to come by car, moped, bike, or foot; they just prioritize getting food to doors

  • quickly, pleasing the consumer regardless of method and undercutting drone delivery

  • in the process.By-and-large, food delivery apps closely match the upside of drones within

  • urban and suburban areas without the hassle of complying with FAA guidelines and figuring

  • out the last foot problem.

  • Adding to the competitive problems facing drone startups, these companies and others

  • have since expanded into grocery, medicine, and goods deliveries.

  • Put simply, from the consumer perspective, the problem drone delivery was designed to

  • address has already been solved without building out a massively complicated aerial delivery

  • network

  • The current low-tech, gig economy model isn't perfect, though.

  • For consumers and restaurants alike, the usage fees are expensive; for those delivering,

  • the pay is minimal; and for the big players, profit has proved elusive.

  • One partial solution is automation.

  • Here still, though, drones are likely to lose out.

  • Ground-based autonomous and semi-autonomous robotics have begun popping up in test markets

  • and partnering with the likes of Uber Eats and Grubhub to expand their reach.

  • While a recent partial ban on sidewalk-wandering robots in San Francisco points to the hurdles

  • the technology faces, these hurdles just won't be as numerous as those facing drones.

  • Automation and technological advances may well help smooth out food and last-mile delivery.

  • In the near future, your prescription, your lunch order, or your afternoon coffee might

  • be showing up at your front door courtesy of an autonomous vehicleyou'll just need

  • to reach down and grab it from a robot instead of unclipping it from a drone above.  

  • Now, many probably now look at drone delivery in retrospect and find it unsurprising that

  • the bombastic claims of the 2010s failed to pan out, but far fewer would have expressed

  • a dissenting opinion just five years ago.

  • That's because this is a rather classic story: that of a hype cycle.

  • A new idea comes around, a few early players start development, then something—a launch,

  • a demo, or even just a domino effectsets off a media firestorm painting a rosy picture

  • of a future revolutionized by this new technology.

  • This story is so archetypal in tech that there's even a theoretical framework defining the

  • process: Gartner's Hype Cycle.

  • According to it, after that media firestorm, that peak of inflated expectations, results

  • slow and sentiment starts shifting downward.

  • Investors complain and the public's memory fades until the media begins coverage of the

  • purported failure.

  • The public grows disappointed, but then grows silent, and in the silence, first generations

  • are adapted into seconds, failures inform potential success, and slowly something meaningfulalbeit

  • minor compared to the original visionstarts to work

  • We are here.

  • While what's happening may be drowned out in the media by what's not, there are applications

  • that are starting to work.

  • Three years ago, Zipline was a small Silicon Valley startup operating a few dozen drone

  • delivery flights per day in one region of Rwanda.

  • They relied on the principle that many medical products are crucially important when used,

  • but not used regularly, and often have short shelf lives, making them tough to economically

  • and efficiently stock at smaller clinic operations.

  • In less developed regions, poor road infrastructure makes many remote clinics many hours or days

  • away from a distribution center, despite relative proximity as the crow flies.

  • Therefore, Zipline's drones acted as a quick, low-cost distribution system for necessary

  • medical products to remote areas dotting Rwanda's rolling hills.

  • Far more places than Rwanda's Southern Province fit this description: nowadays, Zipline operates

  • similar systems in the country's Eastern Province, four regions in Ghana, the US, and

  • a number of other locations are in active development.

  • Excitingly, the news of Zipline's impending expansion to the Ivory Coast hardly made news:

  • it wasn't written about in Wired, TechCrunch didn't publish an article about itjust

  • a simple press release and some industry and regional coverage.

  • This is progress.

  • This shows that Zipline's deployments aren't proofs of concepts, aren't publicity stunts,

  • they're actual, real, commercial implementations.

  • Crucially, Zipline didn't find a use case that drones could fulfillthey found a use-case

  • that only drones could fulfill.

  • They found the healthcare use-casethey found the low-hanging fruit, and other companies

  • are noticing.

  • Matternet and Wingcopter are now placing heavy emphasis on their medical potential as well

  • As the early use-case matures, cost will come down, acceptance will rise, and innovators

  • will find more uses that only the novel technology can fulfill.

  • Once one becomes clear, more must be possible.

  • Eventually, everything will creep closer to that idealistic vision first presented at

  • peak of the hype and then, just slightly delayed behind expectations, the new technology will

  • finally have actually changed the world

  • Unlike delivery drones, what I hope does live up to expectations is our brand-new, feature-length

  • documentary, which came out today after almost a year of work.

  • It's called The Colorado Problem: A River in the Red and rather than trying to describe

  • it, you're about to become one of the first people to see its trailer, but before I need

  • to very quickly remind you that if you're not already a subscriber to CuriosityStream

  • or Nebula, the two sites where you can watch this doc, you subscribe to them both for less

  • than $15 a year at CuriosityStream.com/Wendoverlower than the monthly fee for that big, red streaming

  • site that just jacked up its price.

  • It's these exact subscriptions that enable us to do these big, ambitious documentary

  • projects, so a massive thank you to those of you already subscribed.

  • But now

  • to the point: the trailer.

  • As a reminder, to watch this doc, click the button on-screen or head to CuriosityStream.com/Wendover

  • and you'll get access to both CuriosityStream and Nebula for less than $15 a year

In 2013, Jeff Bezos introduced the world to a concept that promised to revolutionize delivery.

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